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Science & Technology

German physicists to tackle EmDrive mystery

By T.K. Randall
June 10, 2019 · Comment icon 11 comments

Could EmDrive revolutionize spaceflight ? Image Credit: NASA / Mark Rademaker
Scientists in Germany have built a measurement device to determine if the enigmatic EmDrive actually works.
The electromagnetic propulsion engine, which some scientists believe could herald a new era of spaceflight by replacing conventional chemical rocket engines, continues to remain controversial.

EmDrive allegedly works by converting electrical power in to thrust without the need for propellant through a process that scientists argue is in direct violation of the laws of physics.

While previous efforts to test out the device have yielded potentially interesting results, nobody seems to be able to agree on whether it is actually able to produce thrust or not.
The problem is that the observed thrust is so minuscule that it is very difficult to know whether it is being produced by the EmDrive or if it is the result of some other process.

Now though, Martin Tajmar and colleagues of the SpaceDrive project in Germany hope to put the matter to rest once and for all by developing an extremely sensitive new measuring instrument capable of determining whether the observed thrust is really coming from the device.

According to reports, the team's results will be published in August before being presented at the International Astronautical Congress in October.

It is hoped that the findings will finally put the EmDrive debate to bed once and for all.

Source: Wired.com | Comments (11)




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Recent comments on this story
Comment icon #2 Posted by Trihalo42 5 years ago
EmDrive is cone shaped. The Biefeld-Brown drive, which has been dismissed as ionic wind, is supposed to be in a cone shape. The cone shape is important. Gravity is not a "curvature". That's a 2 dimensional analogy people have been stuck on. Some people simply do not comprehend more complex concepts and get stuck on simple analogies and assume that's how something actually works. Gravity is buoyancy. It's an alteration in the density of "space". The 2D analogy has it bending of the 2D plane, but in 3 dimensions it's an alteration in density. That cone shape of the electromagnetic field cause... [More]
Comment icon #3 Posted by Rolci 5 years ago
Amazing how long modern 21-century science takes to verify something extremely simple.
Comment icon #4 Posted by pallidin 5 years ago
It will be interesting to see how professional research evaluates the EM-drive.  
Comment icon #5 Posted by toast 5 years ago
What?   TU Dresden Chair of Space Systems The SpaceDrive Project –First Results on EMDrive and Mach-Effect Thrusters
Comment icon #6 Posted by RabidMongoose 5 years ago
Erm… just no. The EM drive is a pressure drive where the pressure is generated by electro-magnetic radiation (microwaves). As the cone narrows wavelengths of EM radiation now too big to exist between its walls are excluded creating a pressure difference. That causes the cone to accelerate in the direction of its point. It doesnt violate physics and what the scientists who claim so (in the badly written media article) arent taking into account is that space isn't a vacuum. It is full to the brim of EM radiation. Its like putting a empty plastic bottle into the ocean and watching the lack of w... [More]
Comment icon #7 Posted by Rlyeh 5 years ago
Just no.   Rumor has it that if you break a mirror you get seven years bad luck.   They could offer you free mental health services.
Comment icon #8 Posted by It's Just An Opinion 5 years ago
Cars don't run on gasoline alone, They also require water and electricity.
Comment icon #9 Posted by It's Just An Opinion 5 years ago
When Helium is cooled down enough it becomes a super-fluid. In this stage it can literally crawl up the inside of a cup, down along the outside, across the bottom, and back up the other-side into the cup again. because at this form it has practically no friction or in other words “zero viscosity” The same way things out in space that are spun will spin forever (unless they are hit) Helium- (here on earth in its superfluid form) -will stir forever if it is stirred once. So here http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread880365/pg1 a guy asks more or less: [why not use this to generate ener... [More]
Comment icon #10 Posted by and then 5 years ago
Good to know the Chermans are on zee case...
Comment icon #11 Posted by Eldorado 3 years ago
UPDATE: April 05, 2021 “We found out that the cause of the ‘thrust’ was a thermal effect," Tajmar told Grenzwissenschaft-Aktuell.de. "For our tests, we used NASA's EmDrive configuration from White et al. (which was used at the Eagleworks laboratories, because it is best documented and the results were published in the ‘Journal of Propulsion and Power’. With the aid of a new measuring scale structure and different suspension points of the same engine, we were able to reproduce apparent thrust forces similar to those measured by the NASA-team, but also to make them disappear by means o... [More]


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